KL-MOM

Kei-O-Lei, the list is very helpful. We'll pick schools from ur list.

dadgrad

Don't know what their Merit-based aid is, but worth looking at if that is his interest.

dadgrad

Cyberadius: Could you commenbt on Northwestern a bit further?

My D is a junior thinking about Northwestern, and I am wondering how they do for families from CA who have higher incomes, but still challenged by tuition. I have 2 in school with her, and contary to the earlier comment, I think Stanford has been fair with aid. But they have an endowment rouhly twice the size of Northwestern's.

Anyone else had experience with FA at Northwestern?

c-otwa

basically rich schools give more, i'm glad i worked this out eventually...

Bigdaddio

Hi everyone- my daughter scored perfect 800 Reading SAT and 660 in Math- top 1% of her grade- etc etc- my oldest daugter is 2 years into Rutgers with Presidential scholarship (almost free ride) - she was the Valedictorian and we couldn't pass up the free ride (shes in honors engineering and Loves Rutgers - thank God).

Anyway, my wife and I don't have alot of money saved, and middle income , about 100k a year - so won't get much if any financial aid.

If my youngest gets 40 more points in next SAT on Math - shes going to Rutgers on Presidential.

But if not she's probably looking for Liberal Arts school-

Question is what Liberal Arts schools in the northeast give LOTS of merit scholarship for the credentials my daughter has.

Thanks everyone!

Kei-o-lei

^^^

Check out post #374 for a method you can use to identify schools that offer more merit aid, along with a list of examples schools.

You can also easily go to the College Board site, search for colleges, then select the "Cost and Financial Aid" tab; then scroll down to the Financial Aid Statistics and you'll see the "average non-need based aid"

Here's Lehigh's: $11,100
College Search - Lehigh University - Cost & Financial Aid

Kei

P.S. How do you know you "won't get much if any need-based aid?" Data or hearsay?

Bigdaddio

thanks for the response- I know the need based because I've been through the fAFSA for 2 years

ttparent

Kei, you suggest looking at the "average non-need based aid" number reported on CB website, but what does that number really mean? I checked out the number for John Hopkins and it had over 30k, but does that mean that they can offer one 30k scholarship and report as such? Then I went and read the following thread where people suggested many other schools with smaller number but according to them had much better merit aid than JHU:

Hopkins Merit Scholarships

I guess my question is, what is a good way to find financial safety school for a decent above average student but not exactly a 4.0 valedictorian?

mom2collegekids

I don't agree. I think most of the so-called "rich schools" mostly only give out "need" aid...not "merit" aid.

mom2collegekids

If you want some "financial safeties"....I think you need to look at schools that have automatic scholarships....and if they are state U's, then you need to look for those who give to OOS.

Have you looked at UDayton, UAlabama, MissSt? Off the top of my head, they give good merit $$ to students with good stats...There are also some privates in Calif...

What are your child's stats? If they are strong...over 3.5 GPA and high ACT or SAT, some merit money should be available. If you list your child's stats, we probably could find some for him/her.


For example...for Out of State students at UAlabama (in-state student requirements are lower)

Out-of-State Scholarships for 2010-2011
Please review our FAQ section for details on the scholarships listed below.

Capstone Scholar
An out-of-state first-time freshman student who meets the December 1st scholarship priority deadline, has a 27 ACT or 1210-1240 SAT score and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will be selected as a Capstone Scholar and will receive $1,500 per year ($6,000 over four years).

Collegiate Scholar
An out-of-state first-time freshman student who meets the December 1st scholarship priority deadline, has a 28-29 ACT or 1250-1320 SAT score and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will be selected as a Collegiate Scholar and will receive $3,500 per year ($14,000 over four years).

UA Scholar [this scholarship pretty much covers the OOS part of the tuition]
An out-of-state first time freshman student who meets the December 1st scholarship priority deadline, has a 30-31 ACT or 1330-1390 SAT score and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will be selected as a UA Scholar and will receive 2/3 tuition for four years.

Presidential Scholar [full tuition, including OOS costs]
An out-of-state first-time freshman student who meets the December 1st scholarship priority deadline, has a 32-36 ACT or 1400-1600 SAT score and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will be selected as a Presidential Scholar and will receive the value of out-of-state tuition for four years.

BTW...NMF from in-state or OOS get the same great scholarship...full tuition (including OOS costs), housing, laptop, $$ for study abroad, and $1000 stipend.

mom2collegekids

^^^^ for comparison's sake

In-state students get these automatic scholarships at UAlabama

In-State Scholarships for 2010-2011
Please review our FAQ section for details on the scholarships listed below.

Capstone Scholar
An in-state first-time freshman student who meets the December 1st scholarship priority deadline, has a 27 ACT or 1210-1240 SAT score and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will be selected as a Capstone Scholar and will receive $1,500 per year ($6,000 over four years).

Collegiate Scholar
An in-state first-time freshman student who meets the December 1st scholarship priority deadline, has a 28-29 ACT or 1250-1320 SAT score and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will be selected as a Collegiate Scholar and will receive $3,500 per year ($14,000 over four years).

Presidential Scholar
An in-state first-time freshman student who meets the December 1st scholarship priority deadline, has a 30-36 ACT or 1330-1600 SAT score and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will be selected as a Presidential Scholar and will receive the value of in-state tuition for four years.


and...as stated above...NMF from in-state or OOS get the same great scholarship...full tuition (including OOS costs), housing, laptop, $$ for study abroad, and $1000 stipend.

and, other high-achieving in-state or OOS students can apply for Fellows/Academic Elite Scholarship.

polypeptide

are these scholarships for everyone or just residents and citizens ? i am an international student..

mom2collegekids

^^^
The above Alabama scholarships are for residents and citizens. Sorry.

ttparent

Thank you very much for all the info about UA. Although it is not in his radar at all, the scholarships seem very good and extensive. He is 3.75/2210 GPA/SAT student. I'll keep UA in mind when we do our RD applications in about a month or so.

Tilgaham

I'm in the 10th hour of my college admissions process (finalizing my list and doing common app etc). I am pretty much set on which reach colleges I'm going to apply to but my list of match/safeties is up in the air.

I have respectable stats:
UWGPA:3.81
SATI:2350
ACT: 34
SAT II: 3 760's
National AP Scholar as a Junior
Decent EC's , etc etc

I know that my stats are not good enough to get extreemely prestigious schollys to top 20's (unlikely), but I would like to at least try and make my decision process harder by having merit based aid on the table.

I'm also from a rural part of Maryland and am from a family of modest (10kish EFC) income. I've been a lurker/member of CC since my sophmore year and it has been fantastic and instructional in so many ways.

I've done research on my own and am going for merit aid at these schools already:
-Miami
-WashU
-UMaryland

Any suggestions of schools or other ideas would be GREATLY appreciated!